Working on the trains, I've done underground fire training, and some major terminals use Inspector Sands as a euphemism. It means one of the fire call points has been broken, and can a member of staff go to the area mentioned to investigate, e.g. can Inspector Sands go to Platform 2.If you want the alarms to go straight off, you have to break 2 fire call points.

(matt_no_monkey, Fri 15 Nov 2002, 11:33,
archived)

Ooh

I know that one. It's an old theatre trick, as shouting 'Fire!' in a theatre is a crime. So they make an announcement for Mr Sands instead, so all the staff can run away leaving the hapless theatre-goers to fend for themselves.

That recording seems to have been playing at West Ham non-stop for the last few days, for some reason.

If you are in a hotel lift and you hear some bad elevater music like synthesised piano versions of geri's latest hits, this means that there is a major emergency going on, press the red stop button immediately and insist that everyone in the lift sits on the floor of the lift until help arrives.

(drdik, Tue 26 Nov 2002, 12:01,
archived)

Yell Fire

I once yelled "Fire!"...when I fell into that vat of chocolate.La dee doo da la dee do da day.

(Tommy Smothers, Thu 28 Nov 2002, 0:47,
archived)

Here's a time check

I worked in John Lewis's Oxford Street store years ago and we were told during our induction meetings that in the event of a timecheck we were to start hunting for unattended packages...strange how many of us tried to look in the staff loos

For some reason homebase used to have a policy when using the tannoy everything was called 'code **'Code 10 was telephone callCode 20 was to ask a member of staff to a partiucualr placeAs if middle aged couples shopping for fucking paint on a sunday would freak out if they new the manager had a telephone call so they had to disguise it.code 69 was a shoplifter i kid you not.ps i was fired for throwing up on new years day whilst unpacking light bulbs

Hope this goes in the right place this time ... I can't believe someone doesn't maintain a list somewhere of coded emergency announcements. But I just Googled "Inspector Sands" and I couldn't find one.

(Kikujiro, Sun 24 Nov 2002, 1:26,
archived)

Budgens

An announcement of 'code 2' across the tannoy in Budgens means there's a shoplifter in the store.

It's now "Service 100" for shoplifters (at which point "every able-bodied, male member of staff" legs it because nothing brightens up a dull day shelf-stacking than the opertunity to use "reasonable force" on some shoplifter!)

Oh and the "Time Check" thing applies to John Lewis to. If you hear it get out, there's been a bomb threat!

I work in a trendy cafe/bar. We have codes for everything! If someone yells "50" behind the bar, all the bartenders have to lean forward, because '50' is the code for "i'm going to throw something to the skip-rat at the other end of the bar." saves time walking there, doesn't it?

'Mr. Head to the front door' - All able-bodied members of staff RUN to the front door, someone has just chored something.

Code 99 - Bomb scare. All members of staff to report to conference room IMMEDIATELY with exception of till staff and till managers. NB. The company expects volunteers to actually LOOK for the fucking thing (if necessary) before calling in the cavalry.

(DeepFriedPeas, Sun 24 Nov 2002, 19:40,
archived)

Message for Mr Robinson

Now in the good old days of Tescos when cashiers were positively encouraged to chuck everything down the checkout as fast as possible, you sometimes got a till message 'For Mr Robinson' which meant the card was nicked and you got 50 sheets if you held onto before the pikey realised. Kerching!

(dapthechapprobably has this as a status on facebook, Mon 25 Nov 2002, 10:31,
archived)

Security coes

Certain Dixons stores give tannoys like Janitor to software/tills ect because some scrag end looks like they cannot be trusted.Security to zone 3,4 ect this is to scare above scrag end and Code 10 when the scrag end has pinched something and they want all staff to pile in give him a kicking.

(gizepee, Mon 25 Nov 2002, 10:39,
archived)

Budgens codes

I remember back in the day when I worked there, we abused the system.... the manager never figured out that "code 13 aisle one" was our way of telling the other lads about the fit lass by the mangoes....!!!

I once found a gramaphone record containing "this branch of Woolworth's is on fire, repeat, this branch etc etc" that was meant to be played automatically down the telephone to the fire brigade in the event of a fire.

(se8card, Mon 25 Nov 2002, 17:56,
archived)

Fingys

when i worked in a brach of ''Athena'' a cardshop, the security codesfor the bentall centerit was in was code alpha or something forabomb scarefire alarms for a fireand alpha alphafor our store assistance